Surgical implants, such as drug eluting devices, are known to serve as vehicles for the delivery of drugs or other therapeutics. Typically, devices, such as stents, are coated with a biologically active agent to provide treatment to an implant site. It is generally desirable that an effective therapeutic amount of a selected drug be released from the device at a certain rate for an extended period of time. The release of the drug from the coating medium may be dependent upon the nature of the coating material and the drug that is incorporated therein, with drug release occurring by diffusion through the coating material or with degradation of the coating material.
Moreover, implants, such as meshes, are generally customized and cut to a desired size based on anatomical need. However, any cutting or trimming of a drug-eluting implant may affect the drug payload of the device.
Thus, it would be advantageous to provide medical devices including a controllable drug release concentration gradient. It would also be advantageous to provide a device which may be trimmed or cut without affecting the total drug payload of the device.